In South Los Angeles, New Fast-Food Spots Get a ‘No, Thanks’

The city is effectively banning new fast-food places in South Los Angeles, which has much higher rates of poverty and obesity than other areas.Credit
Michal Czerwonka for The New York Times

LOS ANGELES — Driving along Crenshaw Boulevard, it is not difficult to find a place to grab a bite. At some intersections, there is a fast-food joint on each corner.

If the restaurant chains had their way in some parts of town, city officials say, no street would be without its own fast-food outlet.

Los Angeles is making one of the nation’s most radical food policies permanent by effectively banning new fast-food restaurants in South Los Angeles, a huge section of the city that has significantly higher rates of poverty and obesity than other neighborhoods.

A handful of much smaller cities have enacted similar regulations for primarily aesthetic reasons, but Los Angeles, officials say, is the first to do so as part of a public health effort. The regulations, which the City Council passed unanimously last month, are meant to encourage healthier neighborhood dining options. Supporters envision more sit-down restaurants, produce-filled grocery stores and takeout meals that center on salad rather than fries.

“If people don’t have better choices or don’t have the time or knowledge or curiosity, they are going to take what’s there,” said Jan Perry, a city councilwoman who represents part of South Los Angeles and pushed for the regulations. “To say that these restaurants are not part of the problem would be foolish.”

The regulations are not quite an outright ban; existing restaurants can remain open, and exceptions are made for those opening inside a shopping center. Many mom-and-pop businesses or casual restaurants that serve equally unhealthy food can also get permits to open.

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Alina Lester, 4, and Ralph Lester, 3, at Earlez Grille in Los Angeles.Credit
Michal Czerwonka for The New York Times

The City Council first enacted a one-year moratorium in 2008. Since then, no new stand-alone fast-food establishments have opened in the area. Instead, Ms. Perry said, the area got its first new supermarket in roughly a decade.

Bernard Parks, a city councilman who represents parts of South Los Angeles and also pushed for the change, said he was simply trying to apply land-use laws to limit fast-food restaurants the same way other communities do with bars or liquor stores.

“There are people who are accused of being the food police, of trying to control what goes into people’s mouths,” Mr. Parks said. “But we just don’t think that we need to give fast food more rights around here. We don’t think our community needs to have 10 or 15 or 18 ways to eat a hamburger.”

Daniel Conway, a spokesman for the California Restaurant Association, said the limits set a “troubling precedent” and could “throw up a big stop sign” for any potential owner looking to open any kind of food business in the area.

“They have good intentions, but they have taken a kind of approach that emphasizes sticks over carrots,” Mr. Conway said. “We recognize your intent, but you are singling out the wrong thing right now. We basically have a target on our back.”

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, an advocacy group in Washington that has long fought against fast-food chains, is pushing for other cities, including Detroit and Philadelphia, to enact similar limits. But so far, there has been relatively little support from community leaders there.

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Earlez Grille restaurant on Crenshaw Blvd. in Los Angeles, Calif.Credit
Michal Czerwonka for The New York Times

By the council’s estimate, there are nearly 1,000 fast-food restaurants in the 30 or so square miles of South Los Angeles covered by the regulations. Some 30 percent of the 750,000 residents in the area are obese, double the rate in wealthier parts of the city, according to the county’s Department of Health. Residents in the area older than 65 are far more likely to receive diagnoses of diabetes or heart disease, statistics show.

A study released in 2009 by the RAND Corporation, a research group based in Santa Monica, found that the moratorium was unlikely to effectively change the rate of obesity or diabetes in the area. The study argued that rather than focus on calories that come from fast food, policy makers should instead look at junk food snacks from gas stations and convenience stores.

“People get a lot more of their discretionary and unnecessary food from there than from a fast-food restaurant,” said Roland Sturm, a senior economist at RAND and a co-author of the study. “A lot of this is driven by sound bites overlooking what is actually going to have an impact. People talk about this area being a food desert, but it is more like a swamp — you are literally drowning in food, but none of it is really a good option.”

Waiting to find the perfect policy is futile, advocates for such regulations say. They compare the fight against junk food to the early efforts of antismoking initiatives. Later, policy experts can compare the regulations here to, say, New York City’s ban on trans fats.

“There is something inevitable here — you get different things going on in different places and it will just be a matter of time before it starts to have a cumulative effect,” said Kelly D. Brownell, the director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. “To intervene in any one part of the system and expect a significant result is just not possible.”

A trip along Crenshaw illustrates how difficult it might be to change the eating habits of people who have grown up on meals that come with soda and fries. Carl’s Jr., a popular burger chain on the West Coast, was packed in the early afternoon. A group of teenagers had stopped in on their way home from school, eager to gobble up Western Bacon Cheeseburgers — one boy called it his “before-dinner snack.” Cynthia Williams and her two young children sat at another table nearby, picking at their fried chicken stars.

“This is a fun thing for them and easy for me, so how can I not come at least once a week or something like that?” Ms. Williams said. “When you’re out, you are just going to look for the first decent thing around. If there are fewer of them, fine by me, but we’re still going to go to the ones we’ve got now.”

A version of this article appears in print on January 16, 2011, on page A17 of the New York edition with the headline: In South Los Angeles, New Fast-Food Spots Get a ‘No, Thanks’. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe